Electric power to the people: how does electricity affect your life?

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We’re asking Guardian readers to share views of their world in light and dark. How does electricity power your life? What’s it like to live with blackouts? Do you live “off-grid”? Have rising prices made you think differently about how you use energy? Is energy or fuel poverty
affecting you? Share a photo, make a short video or write us a message.

I grew up in Lagos, Nigeria, but a lot of my childhood was spent in the family village in Delta State. Most of the children in our village got together to play and study during the day so it did not matter that we did not have electricity in the daytime. I considered myself extremely lucky to be part of a family that could afford to have a back-up generator, which meant we could treat ourselves to television shows at night. No electricity did not seem like a big deal, until my cousin had a car accident. He was bleeding and needed immediate surgery.

We went from hospital to hospital, but everywhere was pitch black. Finally, we found a clinic with a functioning generator. But we had to go find diesel fuel to power up the generator. His life was spared because we could afford to source fuel quickly, but not every story ends like ours. Not long ago, I received news that an old friend had lost his wife because she had to have a C-section without electricity, in the dark.

It's time to put an end to this. Energy poverty affects more than luxuries, like televisions, refrigerators and cell phones. It can mean the difference between life and death for many families in Africa. And it's standing between Africa and transformative economic development.

That's why I'm proud to champion ONE.org's campaign to bring reliable electricity to 50 million people in sub-Saharan Africa for the first time by supporting the Electrify Africa Act. Please join me and sign the petition here: http://www.one.org/us/energy-poverty/

I grew up in Lagos, Nigeria, but a lot of my childhood was spent in the family village in Delta State. Most of the children in our village got together to play and study during the day so it did not matter that we did not have electricity in the daytime. I considered myself extremely lucky to be part of a family that could afford to have a back-up generator, which meant we could treat ourselves to television shows at night. No electricity did not seem like a big deal, until my cousin had a car accident. He was bleeding and needed immediate surgery.

We went from hospital to hospital, but everywhere was pitch black. Finally, we found a clinic with a functioning generator. But we had to go find diesel fuel to power up the generator. His life was spared because we could afford to source fuel quickly, but not every story ends like ours. Not long ago, I received news that an old friend had lost his wife because she had to have a C-section without electricity, in the dark.

It's time to put an end to this. Energy poverty affects more than luxuries, like televisions, refrigerators and cell phones. It can mean the difference between life and death for many families in Africa. And it's standing between Africa and transformative economic development.

That's why I'm proud to champion ONE.org's campaign to bring reliable electricity to 50 million people in sub-Saharan Africa for the first time by supporting the Electrify Africa Act. Please join me and sign the petition here: http://www.one.org/us/energy-poverty//

With power not being supplied to slums in Mumbai officially, slumlords allegedly distribute electricity at obscenely high rates forcing people to live without electricity. Slum dwellers especially students use street lights for their evening chores.

Perched in the desolate waters of Lake Victoria, Remba Island is overflowing with a population approximately 11,000 strong, crammed onto a barren rock the size of four football pitches. I arrived on a leaky fishing boat overflowing with kerosene, charcoal and batteries- the mainstaples of energy that power this island. The rocky outcrop is a fishing hub largely overlooked by Kenyan authorities and with minimal infrastructure. Wandering the corrugated labyrinth at night you can trace a steady trail of torch lights bobbing through the dark alleys between the small sound systems playing Gospel or Benga and the gas lamp illuminated street vendors. Over the past few months a wind powered microgrid has been rolled out. Paid for using mobile phone payments the AccessEnergy grid is, so far, providing 25 households with a steady flow of affordable clean electricity.

As I write this I'm listening to the whine of my turbine in the wind. Every now and then there's a vicious whir, and then silence. Then, slowly, the whine climbs in pitch again. I look forward to days like these.

That whir represents an overload, a point where the windspeed is too high and the turbine automatically feathers itself out of the wind. It represents about 600 watts peak delivered to the controller by my desk, which from time to time starts up its fans with an answering hum, as it cools itself to handle the load. Outside, the big battery is venting hydrogen as it charges.

Days like this mean that, if I'm not profligate, I won't have to worry about lights or about charging my phone or laptop for at least a week. More, days like this mean I can use my big computer and the satellite uplink to the Internet without worrying. Days like this mean I can use power tools, if I'm reasonably careful about it.

Electricity is a luxury; it does, undoubtedly, make life better. After a fortnight of no wind, or when I have been too self-indulgent with my use of Internet, not having electricity for lighting is a nuisance. But it pleases me that I live within my means, that my power bill this year, like last, will be zero.

On a recent three month placement in Burkina Faso, West Africa I experienced first-hand the significance of electricity in a developing country. As one of the world's most economically deprived countries, Burkina Faso is stuck in a vicious cycle between suffering the effects of climate change and its own energy-dependency. The levels of pollution are high within the country itself, as obviously expensive 'energy efficient' alternatives are not usually an option, but locals have also noticed that they are year-upon-year suffering the increasingly harmful effects of global climate change, for the majority of which developed countries are to blame.

I was living in Burkina Faso throughout what was supposed to be the 'rainy season' - although what I actually experienced was three months of mostly dry, consistently hot weather. Instead there should have been heavy rain almost daily.

My colleagues in Burkina Faso were convinced that the ever-decreasing amount of rain was down to climate change. Many homes and buildings in the capital city of Ouagadougou are fitted with ceiling fans. The lack of 'rainy season' meant that the temperature continued to soar when it should have been eased by rain, therefore people used their fans more and more. Thus, more electricity was used.

There is only one energy company in Burkina Faso and this is owned by the government. With such a surge in energy use given the disruption of the seasons, they introduced controlled power cuts to control the flow of electricity. These power cuts were sporadic and unpredictable - they could last for five minutes or quite literally five hours. Life would grind to a halt and I would find myself smothered by sweltering heat at 9pm at night, sweating through my clothes and praying to the god of electricity for the power to return so that the fans in my house would work again. This happened again, and again, and again.

More importantly though, where I most noticed the importance of electricity not for myself, but for others, was at work. I worked at Djigui Espoir, an incredible organisation for disabled women, where they carried out income-generating activities. The women at Djigui Espoir transform soy beans into products such as tofu and soya milk with the use large, electricity-generated machinery. Djigui Espoir too was trapped in a cycle, of energy-dependency and poverty. Their access to electricity meant that their machines would be powered and the women could product their soy products and possibly make a living. The only problem was that the electricity bills were astronomical and they were struggling to make enough money to cover them let alone generate an income.

However, through some research I came across the idea of solar panels, I'd seen them at home in the UK, and knew of the benefits but had heard that they were expensive. More research showed that 'Renewable Energy to Reduce Poverty' was a real and promising venture that many NGOs had begun to embark upon. I thought that this seemed like the perfect solution for Djigui Espoir - if they could have solar panels fitted, they could power their machinery and gradually save on electricity bills and use that money to support the women of the organisation and expand into something even bigger and better. Furthermore, renewable energy for developing countries in general, I believe, is the way forward and a solution to ending the vicious cycle of climate change and energy dependence.

I'm happy to say that upon returning back to the UK, I have heard that Djigui Espoir has now had visits form an organisation measuring them up for solar panels - I hope this is the start of something positive for the organisation, and that more people in both developed and developing countries can follow suit.

I published a paper in Energy Policy in 2000 which analysed the relationship between electricity use and total energy use with economic development in over a hundred countries, then constituting over 99% of the global economy.

The general conclusions of this research were that wealthy countries have a stronger correlation between electricity use and wealth creation than do poor countries and that, for the global economy as a whole, there is a stronger correlation between electricity use and wealth creation than there is between total energy use and wealth.

The study also showed that, in wealthy countries, the increase in wealth over time correlates with an increase in the proportion of energy that is used in the form of electricity.

Lord Aikins Adusei, who grew up in Ghana and was an intern at the Stockholm Environment Institute earlier this year, offered us a child's insight into growing up without electricity (find the original story here: http://www.sei-international.org/-news-archive/2640):

"I was born in a village called Akrofonso, with a population of around 1300, in the Ashanti Region of the Republic of Ghana. As a child I didn’t know anything about electricity. I didn’t know I could put my food in a fridge for a while and, when I wanted to eat it, put it in a microwave and warm it. I didn’t know I could turn on a stove and boil water to prepare tea before going to school. There was no electricity and therefore there was no appliance in the house that used electricity.

All children should be able to get up in the morning, get a warm shower and have a hot tea or coffee before going to school; while in school be able to use computers and other electronic gadgets that make learning easy and fun; when at home again be able to do homework in the evening, watch television or play some video games, before finally going to bed. While these desires are met in most western countries, it is sad to say that most citizens of our planet that do not have these desires met and also have a lot of difficulties in meeting their energy needs.

The lack of electricity in my village meant that we could only prepare food using firewood or charcoal. The process of getting firewood made all of us children very sad. As a child it was my first duty to help my mother gather firewood and bring it home from the bush. The farm where we could collect the firewood was about five kilometres away and we had to go there on foot. Gathering firewood is one of the most tedious activities for anyone living in a place without electricity.

After walking five kilometres we spent a lot of time collecting firewood. Then, after getting enough, we would tie it and carry it for another five kilometers to the house. I was always tired after any trip. But my ordeal would not end after the 10-kilometre journey; after getting home I would have to wash my clothes and school uniform. That meant fetching water from the stream that was about a kilometre away. My mother’s ordeal did not end there either. She would have to go straight to the kitchen to prepare food and spend about half an hour getting the fire ready before cooking. Since we didn’t have a fridge, my mother also dried fish, meat and vegetables by using the smoke and heat from the fire. The whole house was full of smoke, a situation that always made me uncomfortable.

All this meant that we spent our life gathering firewood, cooking and washing. Every activity involved a considerable amount of time and energy.

But what about my education? How was I able to learn without electricity? Well, I had to do my homework immediately after I came home from school. But sometimes, as soon as I got to the house, I was told, “Mother says there isn’t enough firewood!” I had to rush to the bush and meet her and bring some home. After bringing the firewood home I would be so tired that I would not be able to do the homework. My experience wasn’t different from the rest of the students in the village. The pressure to fetch firewood and to ensure that the family had enough energy in the house was daunting.

Can a child really learn after a 10-kilometre journey carrying firewood? Would a student be able to excel under these conditions? I have to admit that I was unable to read by the time I got to class three. I couldn’t write my name nor speak English or Twi. I was totally illiterate, even though I had been going to school.

In the village the best time to learn was the daytime, and if the day was used to collect firewood or perform non-academic work, it meant we had lost it. With no electricity the only way I could learn was by using a candle or a lantern, and neither were good, but a beggar has very little choice and so I had to make do with it.

Finally, I left our village for a town where there was electricity. There, the students could learn late into the night. I started making improvements with reading and learning and soon became one of the best students in class. I went to secondary school, got one of the best grades in the whole country, then proceeded to sixth form, passed my A-levels and then went to the university.

There was no way I could have made it to the secondary school, let alone to sixth form and to university, without electricity.

However, the situation today has not changed much. The problem of energy access in many parts of Ghana is almost the same as when I was a child. Children are still experiencing the same problems as I had. But today their experience is even more precarious, because most of the firewood is used up. They have to walk several kilometres further than the five kilometres I journeyed to fetch firewood. That means that it is still a big challenge for them to find opportunities to learn and do something meaningful with their lives.

In my village employment opportunities are limited and poverty is high. People are therefore caught in a vicious cycle; lack of access to energy limits their opportunities to study and to do many other things that could improve their lives. The denominator for improving social and economic conditions for people, to fight and end extreme poverty, is – energy. Access to efficient and reliable energy sources hold the key to Africa’s development. Access to energy is the miracle that would push Africa out of the conundrum of underdevelopment and poverty.

Achieving the Millennium Development Goals or new sustainable development goals will be elusive without a clear focus on energy access. Poverty cannot be halved if people do not have electricity to bring out the potential in them and transform their communities. Let us all support the effort to make energy deficiency a thing of the past."

I have Mutiple Sclerosis and am wheelchair bound. Without electricity, my lift couldn't take me to bed and my hoist couldn't lift me into bed. I'd have to spend all day sitting downstairs in my wheelchair. I could do without TV but an inoperative laptop/wi-fi would rob me of my window on the world.

Living in Kathmandu is fascinating, but it can sometimes also be extremely frustrating. Energy distribution is poor throughout the country of Nepal, and in order to equally distribute Nepal's limited energy throughout the capital, the government plans power cuts in advance. This 'planning' is actually a lot more helpful then most would find frustrating... The districts of Kathmandu are separated into districts, and at certain times at the day at least 2 districts do not receive energy from the government. As a foreigner in Kathmandu I have learned to enjoy power cuts, oddly enough. It gives me an opportunity to get involved in more outdoor activities, as opposed to sitting at home on the computer or watching TV.

Though the notion of power cuts are alien to those of use living in the west, I would argue the Nepali's have tackled the issue at its heart by providing an effective way of dealing with them. I used to live in Accra, Ghana, arguably one of the fastest growing developing countries, yet power cuts were constant and erratic. If other developing countries were to employ this organised system, we would surely find them far more bearable.

Here is a link to Kathmandu's power cut schedule (also referred to as 'load shedding') http://www.myrepublica.com/portal/index.php?action=pages&page_id=8. Details of the new schedule are accessible online and in every daily paper.